The present invention relates to improvements in machines which are utilized for the application of articles of hardware or the like to sheets, panels, strips or like carriers which are made of a textile material or of any other suitable penetrable material and on which the applied articles can be used as component parts of snap fasteners or the like. More particularly, the invention relates to improvements in riveting presses and like machines for the application of articles of hardware to garments or the like.
It is already known to equip a riveting press with a magazine for storage of first articles of hardware, and with a second magazine for storage of second articles of hardware each of which is designed to be assembled with a first article. For example, it is known to apply to one side of each of a series of successive garments male or female components of snap fasteners (such components can be said to constitute two different types of first articles of hardware) by means of corresponding retaining articles in the form of rings with prongs which are caused to penetrate through the garment from the other side and to be thereupon coupled to the corresponding (male and female) component. The system for feeding articles to the applicators (i.e., to devices including the tools which actually affix the articles to the respective sides of garments or the like) is often automated so as to ensure immediate delivery of selected articles to the applicators as soon as a machine cycle is completed.
A drawback of presently known riveting presses is that a first machine must be used to assemble first articles of a first type (e.g., male components of snap fasteners) with first articles of a second type (e.g., rings with several prongs), and that a discrete second press is necessary to assemble different (second) articles of the first type (e.g. female components of snap fasteners) with corresponding second articles of the second type. This means that a garment which is to be provided with male and female components of snap fasteners must be treated in a first riveting press and thereupon in a discrete second riveting press. Such operation is time-consuming and cumbersome, and the initial and maintenance cost of several riveting presses is very high.